Hallelujah! A Tipping Point – 20 Massages in 2 Months (Massage #11)

Hot stones used in massage

I received Massage #11 from Avery at the Well-Being Center for Health in Monroe, Washington, one massage past the half-way point of 20. In the aftermath of this massage I was reminded that when the human and invisible worlds find willing partners in one another, it is best to expect the unexpected. Fortunately, what happened was not without some precedent.

In retrospect, I suppose I saw it coming. I can see now that the timing was perfect and that events unfolded as if choreographed, requiring only agreeable participants (albeit with some training).  Through these 11 massages, beneath the work of easing physical symptoms – including chronic neck and back pain, reduced neck mobility, right shoulder and arm numbness, pain in feet and ankles due to bunions and other structural irregularities - something else played out, an emotional and spiritual soundtrack, the drama of consciousness unfolding.

Key in points in the journey include:

·         Massages 1-6 - culminating in Massage #6 with Richard, liberating deeply held terror and past life memories from the neck area. 

·         Massages 7 & 8 - a change in focus from neck and shoulder to feet and ankles. Jennifer, whose technique is so pleasant, began to move defenses in my lower body. 

·         Massage 9 with Aiden - discovering QL muscles, searching for the anatomical connection between neck and feet symptoms, euphoria and the need to sit down afterward to collect my thoughts.

·         Massage #10 with Rose - sacredness and creativity, moving in deep unforeseen places, a knowing that the impact would be felt later. 

Then, yesterday, Massage #11. Avery had decided to heat smooth stones collected from the beach, cover them in oil and use them during the massage, a technique called “Hot Stone Massage." While waiting for the massage to begin I felt unusually grateful and, I felt something else.  But what?  A sense of willing submission to something greater? The pull of mystery?

As some of you may know, beginning in 1995, I experienced a dramatic spiritual awakening, an awakening that continues today. As with most events in life, this awakening had triggers. One trigger occurred in 2001 in the form of a Reiki attunement, an initiation/ceremony that confers the ability to use the hands for healing.

I went to this attunement chiding myself.  I told myself that I couldn’t believe I was paying good money for what seemed like hocus-pocus. Though part of me was enthusiatic about the attunement, another part of me thought I was humoring my healer at the time, Chriss Slivinski, who in spite of my skepticism had helped me to heal from abdominal pain and discomfort. Though I had experienced  the healing power of Reiki first hand, the theory of an attunement – the placing of symbols in the chakras – did not seem plausible. Imagine my surprise when I emerged from the ½ hour ceremony unable to talk without great effort or to open my eyes for more than a few seconds due to the fact that light had become blinding. Following this was weeks and months of insomnia, appetite loss, euphoria, terror, visions and nightmares when I did sleep as cleansing kundalini energy washed through my system, driving the awakening. During this time I practiced Reiki on volunteers – everyone from the stay at home mom in the apartment downstairs to the elderly man with arthritis in the laundromat.  In my case, what came with the attunement was an ability to see more deeply into people’s body’s and lives and more than this, to help  – all as the result of an energy I did not fully believe in.         

Although the learning process ensures that events are always clearer in hindsight, today - in 2011 - an equivalent spiritual trigger may well be these 20 Massages.

I left the massage with Avery feeling that I had had a powerful healing experience.  Afterward I stood at the front desk with Jennifer hoping to schedule some massages. Within minutes I was unable to talk or move without great effort.  I could not hold my eyes open for more than a few seconds as the sunlight which moments before had seem glorious was now blinding.

(for more on Massage #11 see next post)